When she visited �On the Mark,�� a group show at Steven Zevitas Gallery featuring drawings made with itty-bitty gestures, Boston Globe critic Cate McQuaid wanted to push her nose right up against the drawings. “The piece ‘Circle and Line NOF,’ by the granddaddy of the micro-mark, Jacob El Hanani, is covered in circles the size of soda bubbles and lines the length of 5-o�clock-shadow stubble that add up to a plane of flitting shadows and odd breaths of air. It�s a wonder how these artists have the control to make such small marks.
“Julie Miller has several works at the center of the show. Previous pieces swam mainly in one palette; now she�s creating multicolored patterns. She, too, works in champagne-fizz circles. The work ‘o(32)�’ looks like two Persian carpets laid side by side, each with bubbling borders and fringed edges. The deliciously complex ‘o(42)’ loops strings of red and pink, like beaded necklaces, over a pattern of stripes, all held within a jigsaw-puzzle assortment of shapes….
“In all the works here, the emphasis is on accretion � there�s a sense that when these artists first put pen or pencil to paper, they don�t have a clue what will gather under their hands. The process of drawing, not some preconditioned idea, gives birth to these fantastical and surprising works.”
“On the Mark,” Steven Zevitas Gallery, Boston, MA. Through December 11, 2010. Artists include Astrid Bowlby Jacob el Hanani, Xylor Jane, Alexander Kvares, Julie Miller, Evelyn Rydz, Daniel Zeller.
